Whether or not she meant him to be safe and to help him escape, he never knew, though he would have liked to think it was so. It would have made easier the knowledge that he had mated in the course of that strange night just passed, with the Stone’s greatest scourge.
But it was all too late. The sun came in, and there crouched in its rays watching them with contempt and dislike was the mole Tryfan had so long feared he might one day meet.
His eyes were black, his features thin with age, his fur glossy but dry, his talons curved and clean. Behind him ranged moles Tryfan knew must be sideem, but they were older than any other he had seen. Older and senior, all slim, all elegantly cruel of feature, all powerful in that way that engenders surprise and fear when it is seen in a mole who should have reached an age of relaxation. A strength preserved for arid things.
“My name is Rune,” said Rune. “And you are Bracken’s son.”
Tryfan felt then the fear of death and knew he faced it there.
“I am,” he said.
“Your father nearly had the strength to kill me, but he failed. I have never forgotten that he tried. Your mother I desired, and but for Bracken that might have been. So I have reason enough to kill you. Now you come to Whern, welcomed, unharmed, and you ravage Henbane here. That is reason enough to kill you in another way.”
Despite the fear he felt, and the helplessness, for the sideem closed in all about him and he had no way to go, Tryfan even then thought of another mole.
“Spindle has harmed nomole, nor will he. Let him at least be free. You have myself and Boswell, you....”
Rune raised his left paw slightly. His face, close to, was lined, even frail, but there burned out of his eyes a black hatred and contempt for life and normal living.
“He shall not be harmed,” said Rune, “not physically, just as you will not die. My duty is to find due punishment. You came here alive, and your weak followers must know you left here alive, as they must learn what you did here with Henbane. So very well.” He looked at Henbane briefly, and his thin pale tongue glanced across his mouth and then was gone. “I believe your followers will feel you were deserving of just punishment, Tryfan.”
It was only then that, in some way that Rune moved or spoke, some hint in his form, that Tryfan must have recognised the truth of Rune and Henbane, and seen he was her father, for he turned to Henbane and said with a contempt to his voice that equalled Rune’s, “Look at him, the Master of the Sideem! Look close. Can you not see who he is, Henbane, and what he has done even to you? He is your father!”
As Henbane looked at Rune, and the first creepings of suspicion came to her, Rune turned from them both and said to the waiting sideem, “He babbles. So do it, now, and well. Do it.”
Then as he pulled back, the sideem advanced upon Tryfan, and in terrifying silence began to bring their trained talons down upon him. And though he fought and wounded a few yet soon his paws were stilled and he slumped in his own blood beneath their blows. Before his eyes were taloned, he saw their hatred raining down upon him, and before his hearing was lost to the points of their talons he heard the vileness of their grunting breaths. And before the place was lost in darkness to him he reached out to touch Henbane of Whern, but felt instead her touch to him and knew that somewhere deep within that befouled heart was a moment at least of pity. Then the pain overwhelmed him, and he felt himself destroyed and began to know a darkness inflicted by the Word, in which there was not Stone nor hope of Stone, and living death has come.
Chapter Forty-One
Rarely, in the whole of moledom’s long history, can there ever have been such an outraged and protesting mole as fat, reluctant Bailey sinking helplessly down into the sucking pool into which Mayweed forced him that day.
His watery protest and anger doubled and redoubled as the bitter cold of the water knocked the breath out of his spoilt body, and he found himself being turned over again and again, this way and that, as curious colours of surging yellow and deep green, black and then mottled white came before his eyes.
His outrage increased still more as, swept along, he realised that this was not the first time such an indignity had happened to him but the second: for he had been one of those in the tunnel collapse during the evacuation from Duncton Wood. And such can be mole’s sense of injustice that, even as he now began to die, he was thinking, “It’s not fair, not twice!”
Then as his breath began to give out, and his chest to feel exploding pain and his paws to scrabble at anything and nothing in the Sinks into which he had been dragged, he felt buffets of rock on his shoulders and painful scrapings of gravel on his snout and he knew, even as his outrage climaxed into a futile underwater cry of protest, that he was about to die.
Which, almost to his greater annoyance – for death might have justified his rage and not made him feel so silly – did not happen. Instead his chest pain continued, he reached out his paws as if to find air, the noises in his plump ears reached a crescendo of horribleness and suddenly his snout and face seemed to burst out of the terrible submersion they were suffering into the cold chill of a deep cavern’s still air, and he knew he was alive.
Alive! Not drowned and dead. Alive to live! And Bailey felt a surge of relief and joy such as he had not felt for many moleyears, indeed, from the very moment that he had first met Henbane of Whern.
Splash went the waters about him, and high above, as he gulped in air, he saw a most beautiful thing, and that was a shaft of light coming down on to the water where he floated in chilly languor, his stomach a rotund shadow at each corner of which floated a paw, and at one end of which bobbed his head, whose mouth gulped and muttered, “Never again! Not going anywhere near water ever! Bailey and water don’t mix! I hate Mayweed because it’s always his fault!”
But his plaints ceased suddenly when, the light above drifting slowly behind him, he heard an ominous sucking sound and water’s roar ahead. Total panic overtook him and he turned over on to his front, scrabbled about desperately, felt a gravel bottom, and with ill grace and enormous speed considering his size, pulled himself on to the subterranean shore where he slumped panting fit to burst.
But he was alive and he would never have believed it possible that he could have felt such happiness in such a place. But Bailey did. Alive!
He heard a spluttering and splashing out in the midst of the expanse of water from which he had just escaped.
“Boswell!?” he called out hopefully.
But as the watery sounds continued, and nomole replied, the appalling thought occurred to him that he might be alone in this great cavern with a beast of the deep which, scenting his flesh, was making its ponderous way across the water to eat him.
“Is that mole?” he whispered nervously.
“Yes, yes, of course it’s mole,” said Boswell irritably from out of the murk. “Now come here and help me out.”
Relieved once more, overjoyed yet again, Bailey waded back in and helped Boswell on to the shore.
As they shook themselves dry a voice floated over the water to them from the far side of the pool, whose size they only began to see as their eyes adjusted to the lack of light.
“Splashing Sirs, Mayweed hears you but cannot see you so kindly make a sound so that he may find you....”
“What sound?” said Bailey, reminded by Mayweed’s voice of the outrage to his dignity he felt he ought to feel. “I’m cold and wet and very hungry and I want to know how we are going to get out of here. Henbane will be furious, and you know what that means. No, you probably don’t. Well, I do and it’s not nice. It’s not!”
“Bothered Bailey, Mayweed thanks you for making a guiding sound,” said Mayweed, coming along the terrace of sand and gravel on which they had been washed by the stream, “and now he asks you to stop complaining once and for all.”
“But —” began Bailey.
Mayweed turned to Boswell and quickly saw that apart from being cold and wet, and having a bloody gash above his right eye, he was all right.<
br />
“I hurt,” said Bailey.
Mayweed turned on him.
“Sir,” he said, “Mayweed also hurts. Boswell hurts. Moledom hurts. Humble me and aged Boswell here are not interested in what you have to say unless it’s useful.”
“Well I suggest we get out of here quick,” said Bailey.
Mayweed smiled.
“Mayweed is sure that Boswell and he himself agree with that, and is pleased to observe once more that when moles are physically beset they are inclined to a concurrence of action rather than a discordance of complaints and protests. Mayweed is glad that tubby Bailey is showing signs of being normal.
“Now, Mayweed has come to know this type of tunnel well and has this to say. It is a killing place a cavern like this, for chill sets in a mole’s flesh and mars his judgement. Movement is vital, the swifter the better. However, humble he is sure that the two escapees will be advised to stay underground as long as they can. Follow this stream, there will be tunnels adjacent because that is the way of Whern.”
“What do you mean “two” escapees?” said Bailey quickly.
“Mayweed is not coming with you, dependent Sir. You are taking Boswell here to safety. It is called a task. Mayweed sympathises with daunted Sir at the suddenness of it but, noting Sir’s corpulence and knowing the rigors of the days ahead he is, on the whole, inclined to think that fat Sir will benefit.”
“How?” said Bailey, rubbing his head where a bump was showing from his recent rush through the water.
“It will make him thin,” smiled Mayweed, “and humbleness is sure that Sir will wish to be presentable when he travels south. Fatness is not welcome there as it suggests a mole is lazy and good for nothing.”
“But Henbane —” said Bailey doubtfully.
“Henbane will kill Sir if she catches him. For now she and all the sideem will think Sir dead, and Boswell here as well. Good. Do not be found. Creep, so far as Sir’s belly allows. Go carefully. Listen to wise Boswell here and rediscover your common sense! Go, Sirs both, now! Before the cold sets in.”
“You are not coming, then?” said Boswell.
“Wise Boswell, the Stone works strangely. It made me see a mole, beauteous and fair of fur. Mayweed desires to be alone no more. Mayweed will go back and find her.”
“Whatmole is that?” said Bailey.
Mayweed described her.
“That’s Sleekit you mean. She’s sideem, very important sideem. Closest female to Henbane, only other female in Whern. She’s horrible.”
“Sir will forgive this observation but on the subject of female form humbleness very much doubts gluttonous Bailey is a sound judge. He reminds Sir that though she may be horrible at least she’s not fat.”
“I don’t know why I ever liked you, Mayweed. Well, maybe I didn’t. Maybe only horrible Starling did.”
“Humble me trusts that one day fat Sir will be thin, and then rediscover why he liked Mayweed and loved Starling,” said Mayweed.
Boswell laughed. “I am cold, Bailey,” said Boswell, “and we had better do as Mayweed suggests, and go. So lead on!”
“Me?” he gasped. “But...!”
Boswell turned to Mayweed and touched him gently with his good paw.
“May the Stone’s will be thine soon, mole, for thou art worthy. Find Sleekit, engage her help for your final task in Whern. When the time comes seek out Tryfan once more for there will be a time when he needs you as you will need him.”
With that Boswell started to limp slowly downstream along the bank with the high light of the cavern shining down on his wet fur. Bailey, with one final heaving sigh of general protest, turned to follow him and Mayweed, having watched them disappear into the tunnels at the far end of the chamber, turned and snouted up the other way until, finding some cleft in the seemingly impregnable wall of the cavern, he started a slow ascent up it, and was gone.
Although Spindle had feared that something might happen to Tryfan once he was taken from their chamber of confinement away to Henbane’s den, he had no inkling of what it might be. Nor was he warned what to expect by the silent and hurried sideem who came for him and, without explanation, led him southward through the High Sideem.
They stopped only once, and that briefly, and afterwards Spindle sometimes doubted his memory of that strange moment at all.
An old sleek mole stared at him from the corner of a chamber, with senior sideem flanking him protectively. Spindle remembered his gaze most of all, which was cold and penetrating, and pitiless. As he began to speak Spindle knew it was Rune.
“Tryfan of Duncton has been punished and he is yours to take from here. Tell moles that may ask that he was punished of the Word, which was merciful and did not take his life. He came here to Atone, but he abused our trust. He has been cleansed by punishment.
“As for you, Spindle of Seven Barrows, be grateful that our promise, even though to a flawed mole, is stronger than our judgement, which would have meted you a punishment such as Tryfan had. We have no doubt that you are and remain of the Stone, but that is of no consequence now. Faith in the Stone is all but dead, and a mole like you is unlikely to inspire confidence in its revival.”
There was a brief simper of a smile among the sideem. Spindle found himself unable to speak before this mole’s gaze, unable even to think on the words he said. He knew only that Tryfan was hurt and that he desired be taken to him to help him.
“Take him to the surface now,” said Rune indifferently, “and help me back to Henbane. She will be needing me now, very much, and desiring of my help.”
Spindle had time to see the sideem lead Rune away and to feel an overwhelming loathing which was alien to him. When he had been speaking Rune had commanded the chamber and nomole else in it seemed of significance; but as he went away Spindle saw how thin and frail he was, and that his skin was skeined and wrinkled on his flanks, and his fur thin. There was a sense of meanness about his gait, and indulgence – not of the body but of the spirit.
Spindle turned away in disgust as the sideem mole-handled him up to the surface. There he found himself on the westward flanks of Whern itself, and for a moment his doubts and fears were forgotten as he saw the great heathered rises of the lowering moor caught in late September sun and showing russet and purple. The sun seemed to ride southwards across the moor in waves where gaps in the cumulus cloud let it through, but the wind was cold.
“He’s there, mole,” said one of the sideem curtly, pointing to what Spindle had taken to be no more than shadowed roots about a hag of heather nearby, “and may the Word go with thee. Take him and leave here, leave now and be heard of no more. We shall give you no more than a few days and then if you are seen you shall be killed. Your day and that of the Stone is done, praise be the Word.”
The sideem left and Spindle moved cautiously in the direction they had pointed. Soon he saw that what he had thought was shadow was mole. The grass and heather all about was bloodied, the mole unrecognisable.
“Tryfan?” began Spindle doubtfully, feeling exposed and nervous. “It’s me, it’s Spindle.”
Tryfan did not move. Spindle approached nearer, and went round Tryfan’s prone body to look at his face and snout. They, too, were unrecognisable, but seemed at first a mass of blood and open wounds. Not “wounds” but wound, a single dreadful spreading thing that started at what Spindle saw was his mouth and spread across his snout and eyes and ears to all his head. Swollen, bloody, and strangely glistening. Spindle started back in disgust, for the bloody mess they had made of Tryfan was now the feeding ground for midges, thousands of them, which had settled on the congealing blood in grey and bristling rows.
For a few moments he angrily tried to brush these off but the slightest touch or movement brought a frightening gasp and screams of pain from Tryfan who, seeming to think that Spindle was one of the punishing sideem, sought pathetically to shrink away.
If Spindle thought then that he was in a nightmare, it was one that was only just beginning. For even as he star
ed in horror at what he saw, and began to notice that the wounds extended to Tryfan’s flanks and beyond, and then to his two front paws which had been horribly crushed and torn, a black shadow shot over them both, wheeled, hovered, stopped, and cried out its corvid hunger. Feeding raven. Then another. Then a third. They fluttered, half turned in the air, and dropped like plague among the heather and rocks. Then they rose up again and as one, it seemed, attacked.
Spindle turned with talons raised and protected Tryfan from the onslought, the midges feeding on, and only when dusk came did the ravens depart, their great beaks shining with the autumn sun.
That night Spindle found a use at last for the skill in corpse clearing he had learned at Skint’s paws in the Slopeside of Buckland.
He half carried, half pulled Tryfan downslope to the bank of a stream where limestone showed, and found sanctuary there under some rocks. He washed the wounds clean with his own spittle and the coolness of the rocks kept the midges at bay.
He was reluctant to leave Tryfan but had to do so to find food, which was difficult there. What little he found he brought back and masticated to a pulp for Tryfan in the hope that he might force some into his mouth.
Tryfan screamed again at this, and Spindle felt as if he was killing him and was in tears, but he persisted and a little of the food was taken. After that there seemed nothing for him to do but keep his friend warm and wait.
Nomole came that night, nor any creature, but in the morning there was the scutter of beaks on the rocks nearby. Ravens again. Then a stoat came whiffling near and Spindle crouched defensively by Tryfan, staring out from the rocks that protected them, watching back and fro and to the sides, in case of attack.
It came soon enough. Stoat claws thrusting under stone, muzzle snarling under rock, the foetid stoat breath making Spindle nauseous. But he struck back as hard and fast as he could and the attack died.
Duncton Quest Page 77
